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Time to start building!

In Part 3 of the Beginner Tutorial, you will learn the following:
Panel
titleBeginning Tutorial Part 3 Learning Objectives
  • How to add, delete, and change the order of questions in a form
  • What some of the different question types are
  • How to add Question IDs and what they mean
  • Adding and editing Label Text

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After hitting "create" or "edit" on your form, you are inside the Form Builder. The Form Builder is Dimagi's easy-to-use interface for building CommCare forms. As mentioned in CommCare Fundamentals it is possible to use other tools as well, once you are comfortable with the process and structure, it is possible to use other tools to create forms.

Question Bar

Along the top of the screen you will see the Question Bar , in which that displays a number of different icons which represent question types. You can click on the drop down arrows to see which the types of questions are in each menu.

There are several buttons, each one for Each icon represents a type of question to that you can add to your form. These questions will appear in your "Question Tree" in the order they will appear on your device. In orderFrom left to right, these categories of buttons are as follows:

  • Text: Inserts a text question or a "label" that does not elicit a user response
  • Multiple choice: Inserts a multiple choice question that can have a single-answer (i.e. Do you have children? yes or no) or multiple answers (i.e. which foods do you like? pizza/toast/peanut butter/apples/carrots)
    • Choice: Inserts the options within available for your multiple choice question
  • Number: Inserts a question with a numeric response , such as a (i.e. phone number or age)
  • Date: Inserts a date or time question
  • Hidden Value: Allows access to values from other forms or allows you to perform more complex calculations. The user does not cannot see a hidden value when working in the form.
  • Group: Provides a structure to keep related questions together
  • Multimedia Capture: Inserts a question that captures an image, audio, or video file
  • Advanced: A list of more advanced , less common question typesand less commonly used types of question

You can hover your cursor over the question button to see what it doesthe type of question it will add. For more information on the From Builder and Question types see our Form Builder Help Page.

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You will now see that there are two sections in the Form Designer main page:

  1. Question Tree- this is where you will be able to navigate among questions and change the order of questions
  2. Question Properties - this is where you control the actual content and properties of each question. This section is further divided into four sections:
    1. Basic- the Question ID is what you will see in the data export, and the Label is the text that the mobile user will be seeing.
    2. Logic- this is where you can control whether a question is required, whether you only want a question to display some of the time, and if you want to put any limits on what type of answer you will accept.
    3. Media- for adding multimedia
    4. Advanced- advanced stuff that we don't have to look at right nowoptions that are discussed in other tutorials.

In this tutorial we will only be concerned with the Basic and Logic sections.

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Info
titleMore detail on Question IDs!

You can't put just anything as a Question ID. Here are the rules:

  • No spaces (underscores are fine; if you try to add a space it will be replaced by an underscore)
  • No special characters (like "&" and "$")
  • Cannot start with a number
  • Cannot be the same as another Question ID in the same form

If you violate one or more of these rules, you'll get a warning message! Try it!

In addition, we can suggest some best practices for Question IDs:

  • Make them descriptive- when you look at the data exports you are not going to see the Label text; you are only going to see the Question ID.
  • Be consistent- it is best to have a simple system such as using CamelCase or using underscores like first_name. This will make it easier when you are referencing Question IDs later.

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  • Add another text question from the Question Bar by clicking the "T" button
  • Set the Question ID to village_name
  • Set the Label text to: Village Name:

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Look at the question tree- now we have two questions, woman"Woman's name and village name. Name" and "Village Name." Let's say we want to put "Village name Name" as the first question. You will click on "Village Name" in the Question Tree, and then drag it above "Woman's Name". There is a small bar that will show where the question is going to be inserted and you will also see a green check mark.  It will look like this:

  • Move Drag Village Name above Woman's Name in the Question Tree and let go when you see a green check mark, as shown above

Date Question: Last Menstrual Period (LMP)

  • Add a Date question from the Question Bar (by clicking on the calendar icon)
  • Set the Question ID to: lmp
  • Set the Label Text to: Date of Last Menstrual Period

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To do that, click on the "multiple choice" question button in the Question Bar to add a question. Make sure you choose this icon: Image Added  (Careful! We want a single answer question rather than multiple answer)

When you do that you will see that the circle button next to it lights upbecomes active:

  • Click the "Add Answer" button twice to add both answers. It should look like this in the Question Tree:

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However, we also need to change the names of the choices. Click on one of them and you will see something similar to what you have seen for other questions:

The Answer Value is similar to the Question ID - this is how the data will be coded; the Label is the text that the user will see. 

Set the first one to:

  • Choice Value: yes
  • Label: Yes

And the second choice:

  • Choice Value: no
  • Label: No

It will look like this:

Expand
titleCurious how this question will look on the mobile device? Click here to see what the question will look like on CommCare for Android Smartphones.

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